Thursday, December 08, 2016

From Naval History and Heritage
Command, Communication and Outreach Division

1796 - In his Eighth Annual
Message to Congress, President George Washington urges Congress to increase
naval strength.

1941 - In one of the defining
moments in U.S. history, the Japanese attack the U.S. Pacific Fleet and nearby
military airfields and installations at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and remove the
U.S. Navy’s battleship force as a possible threat to the Japanese Empires
southward expansion. The U.S. is brought into the World War II as a full
combatant.

1941 - As the Japanese attacked
Midway Island, 1st Lt. George H. Cannon, USMC remained at his post until all of
his wounded men were evacuated, though severely wounded himself. Because of his
dedication to his men, Cannon died due loss of blood from his wounds. For his
"distinguished conduct in the line of his profession", Cannon is
posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor. Lt. Cannon is the first Marine
to be awarded the Medal of Honor in WW II.

1941 - Capt. Mervyn Sharp Bennion,
commanding officer of USS West Virginia (BB 48), evidenced apparent concern
only in fighting and saving his ship, and strongly protested against being
carried from the bridge. For devotion to duty and courage during the Pearl
Harbor attack, Bennion posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor.

1941 - Ensign Francis C.
Flaherty remained in his turret, holding a flashlight so the remainder of the
turret crew could see the escape, thereby sacrificing his own life. For
devotion to duty and courage during the Pearl Harbor attack, Flaherty is
posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor.

1941 - Lt. Cmdr. Samuel Glenn
Fuqua rushed to the quarterdeck of USS Arizona, where a large bomb hit and
penetrated several decks. The explosion started a severe fire and also stunned
and knocked him down. Upon coming to, he began to direct the firefighting and
rescue efforts. A tremendous explosion forward appeared to make the ship rise
out of the water, shudder and settle down by the bow. Flames enveloped the
forward part of the ship and spread as wounded men poured out of the ship to
the quarterdeck. Despite the mayhem, Fuqua kept calm under pressure and
continued to direct the firefighting efforts so that the wounded could be taken
from the ship, and in so doing inspired everyone who saw him. Realizing that
the ship could not be saved and that he was the senior surviving officer
aboard, he ordered the crew to abandon ship. Fuqua remained on the quarterdeck
until satisfied that all personnel that could be had been saved, after which he
left the ship with the last boatload. Lt. Cmdr. Fuqua is awarded the
Medal of Honor.

1941 - Chief Boatswain Edwin
Joseph Hill, while leading his men of the line-handling details of USS Nevada
to the quays, cast off the lines and swam back to this ship. Later, while on
the forecastle attempting to let go the anchors, he was blown overboard and
killed by the explosion of several bombs. Chief Hill is posthumously awarded
the Medal of Honor for his distinguished conduct in the line of his profession,
extraordinary courage, and disregard of his own safety during the attack on the
Fleet in Pearl Harbor.

1941 - Ensign Herbert C. Jones
organized and led a party in supplying ammunition to the antiaircraft battery
of the USS California after the mechanical hoists were put out of action. Jones
was then fatally wounded by a nearby bomb explosion and when two men attempt to
take him from the area which was on fire, he refused to let them, saying, in
words to the effect, “Leave me alone! I am done for. Get out of here before the
magazines go off.” Ensign Jones is posthumously awarded the Medal of
Honor.

1941 - Rear Adm. Isaac C. Kidd
immediately went to the bridge and as the commander of Battleship Division One,
he courageously performed his duties as Senior Officer Present Afloat until his
flagship, USS Arizona, blew up from magazine explosions and he is killed by a
direct bomb hit on the bridge. Admiral Kidd is posthumously awarded the
Medal of Honor.

1941 - As the mechanized
ammunition hoists are put of action in USS California, Chief Radioman Thomas
James Reeves, on his own initiative, in a burning passageway, assists in the
maintenance of an ammunition supply by hand to the antiaircraft guns until he
is overcome by smoke and fire, resulting in his death. Chief Reeves
posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor.

1941 - As his station in the
forward dynamo room aboard the USS Nevada became almost untenable due to smoke,
steam, and heat, Lt. Cmdr. Donald Kirby Ross forced his men to leave the
station and performed all the duties himself until blinded and unconscious.
Upon being rescued and resuscitated, he returned and secured the forward dynamo
room and proceeded to the aft dynamo room where he was again rendered unconscious
by exhaustion. Again he recovered consciousness and returned to his station
where he remained until directed to abandon it. Machinist Mate [Later Lt.
Cmdr.] Ross is awarded the Medal of Honor.

1941 - Chief Aviation
Ordnanceman John William Finn manned a .50-caliber machine gun mounted on an
instruction stand in an exposed section of the parking ramp, under heavy enemy
machine-gun strafing fire. While painfully wounded, he continued to man the gun
and return the enemy’s fire with telling effect throughout the enemy strafing
and bombing attacks. He was at last persuaded to leave his post to seek medical
attention after being specifically ordered to do so. After receiving first-aid,
the chief returned to the squadron area and actively supervised the rearming of
returning planes. Chief (later Lieutenant) Finn earned the Medal of Honor that
day for his extraordinary heroism, distinguished service, and devotion above
and beyond the call of duty during the attack on the Fleet in Pearl Harbor.

Sunday, December 04, 2016

Seventy-five years ago this December 7th Wednesday, Japanese
aircraft slashed through the morning skies over Pearl Harbor Naval Station,
Ford Island Naval Air Station, Hickam Field Army Air Corps Station, and Wheeler
Field and the Schofield Barracks Army Station on the northwest side of Oahu.

Alerted by the thump of bombs falling from high above, and from
the rattle of machine gun fire from low flying Japanese A6M-2 Zero-Sen Fighters
on strafing runs, the ships of the United States Pacific Fleet were slow to
react. Slowly, battle stations were manned, and ammunition broken out from
magazines was finding its way to US Navy gunners. It was far too little and far
too late. Japanese Val dive bombers and Kate torpedo planes began streaking in
on their runs, delivering telling blows to the big ships.

In human lives, the attack on Pearl Harbor was horrific. 2,403
were dead, and 1,178 wounded.

188 planes were destroyed, the vast majority on the ground, as
only a few Army Air Corps fighters managed to get airborne. A further 159
aircraft were significantly damaged, leaving only 43 planes operational at
attack’s end.

It was the toll in ships that was staggering, however.

“Battleships

· Arizona blown up with a loss of 1,177 men.

·Oklahoma capsized with a small part of her hull above
water.

· California “sank gradually for about three or four days:
and came to rest rather solidly on a mud bottom, with her mainmasts and the
upper parts of her main batteries above water. “The quarterdeck [was] under
about twelve feet of water...”

· Nevada, which got under way, beached in the narrow
channel opposite Hospital Point in a wrecked condition.

· Pennsylvania, in drydock, with considerable damage, “but
not of vital nature.”

· Utah, then used as a target ship, capsized, having been
at the Saratoga’s regular berth.

Light Cruisers

· Raleigh, Helena, and Honolulu moderately
damaged.

Destroyers

· Cassin and Downes, in Drydock No. 1, severely
damaged.

· Shaw’s bow blown off while in floating drydock, severely
damaged.

Others

· Vestal (repair ship) was along side the Arizona when the
raid commenced and was beached at Aeia to prevent further sinkage.

· Curtiss (seaplane tender) was badly damaged by a crashing
plane and one 500-lb. bomb.

· Oglala (minelayer) capsized.”*

For the Japanese, the cost was minimal.

“Twenty-nine planes did not return: fifteen dive bombers and
high-level bombers, five torpedo planes, and nine fighter escorts. The midget
submarines inflicted no damage, and none returned to their mother ships; four
were sunk, and one was wrecked on a reef, its captain captured. One I-class
submarine was also sunk.”*

[*Dull, Paul S., A Battle History of the Imperial Japanese Navy
(1941-1945). United States Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 1978.]

In spite of the overwhelming destruction inflicted on the US
Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor, the Japanese were foiled by a number of things
that did not go according to plan, or were missed by the planners. The attack
called for strikes particularly on the US Aircraft Carriers, however, they were
at sea at the time of the attack and were missed. Additionally, millions of
barrels of oil were stored in large tank farms behind the US Submarine base at
Pearl Harbor, and also between there and another tank farm near Hickam Field.
The Japanese left them totally unscathed. They also failed to attack the
submarine section of the sprawling naval base. With the exception of a number
of Cruisers and Destroyers based elsewhere throughout the Pacific, the surface
fighting arm of the Pacific Fleet was on the bottom at Pearl Harbor, but the
Aircraft Carriers, their pilots and planes were intact, as were the submarines,
and their facilities at Pearl Harbor. The remains of the Pacific Fleet would not
suffer for the want of oil to patrol the waters of the Pacific either.

The Japanese sneak attack catapulted the isolationist American
nation to a Declaration of War, made by Congress the following day, at the
request of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in his stirring “Day of Infamy”
speech.

The rest of the story…Arizona
was the ship that suffered the most damage. Devastated when a bomb ripped
through the main deck and exploded in the forward magazine. Arizona has
come to symbolize the events of December 7th at Pearl Harbor. Some of her dead
lie still entombed within her, the rest buried in the cemetery at the “Punch
Bowl”. The USS Arizona remains in commission as a U.S. Navy ship.

The former battleship Utah was converted to an auxiliary
vessel in 1931 and used as a radio controlled target ship. Later, she was
converted back to a gunnery training ship. Moored on the opposite side of Ford
Island from Battleship Row on December 7th the Utah was in the spot
where the aircraft carrier Saratoga usually was to be found. Utah
received the attention of dozens of Japanese planes; struck repeatedly by bombs
and torpedoes, she rolled over and sank. Later the hulk was raised and moved
closer to Ford Island where she remains today.

Horribly mangled by bombs and torpedoes, the Nevada, the
only battleship to get under way, was intentionally beached to prevent her
sinking. Repaired and returned to service by 1943, she took part in a raid on
the Aleutian Islands and eventually made her way to the Atlantic where she provided
shore bombardment at Normandy on D-Day in 1944.

Capsized, the Oklahoma was eventually partially raised but
never repaired. A frantic rescue effort went on for days after the attack
trying desperately to free men trapped inside the overturned hull.

Flagship of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, Pennsylvania was in
drydock at the time of the attack, sharing the drydock with the destroyers Cassin
and Downes. Pennsylvania’s damage was minimal, thanks in no small
part to the sturdiness of the drydock caissons. Japanese aircraft tried
repeatedly to torpedo the Pennsylvania, but the drydock walls absorbed
the hits. Not so lucky were the two destroyers in with the Pennsylvania, USS
Cassin DD 372 and USS Downes DD 375. The Downes and Cassin
were both salvaged with much equipment taken off their ruined hulls and
installed on new hulls in the U.S. Re-launched, these “new” vessels went on to
fight in many of the western Pacific Campaigns from 1943 on. The Pennsylvania
was quickly repaired and returned to service. In 1944 she participated in the
bombardment of Guam prior to the invasion there, and later saw action at the
Battle of Surigao Strait.

The Tennessee was moored inboard of the USS West
Virginia, and was thus protected from torpedo attack. She was scorched by
the flaming oil from the Arizona, and received two bomb hits on her main
gun turrets. After a period of repair and modernization in California, the Tennessee
resumed duty, participating in all the major offensives of the Western Pacific
from early 1943 on. Tennessee took part in the Battle of Surigao Strait
and later had a hand in the sinking of the IJN super battleship Yamato.

Severely damaged by torpedoes and bombs, and sunk at her berth, California
was a major salvage undertaking and was not completed until January of 1944.
She took part in the major Pacific campaigns of 1944 and 1945, and fought in
the surface action against Japanese Battleships at the Battle of Surigao
Strait.

Perhaps the least damaged of all the battleships at Pearl Harbor, Maryland
turned out to be the unluckiest. After a brief overhaul stateside in 1942, Maryland
returned to combat status. While supporting Marine amphibious operations at
Saipan in 1944 she was torpedoed by a Japanese plane. After another repair
period, Maryland returned to the firing line at the Palau Islands, and
operated with the fleet during the Leyte invasion in October 1944, including
the Battle of Surigao Strait. A month later she was struck in Leyte Gulf by a
Japanese Kamikaze aircraft, requiring still another overhaul. She returned to
the line just in time for the end of the war in the Pacific.

Next to the Arizona, the West Virginia took the
worst beating at Pearl Harbor. Several bomb hits and at least seven torpedo
hits all on one side. Excellent damage control kept her from rolling over, and
thus allowed many of her crew to escape. She was re-floated and repaired, and
back in action by July of 1944, in time to participate in the closing months of
the war in the Pacific.

USS Helena CL 50. Helena
was a brand new light cruiser. At Pearl Harbor she was struck in an engine room
by a single torpedo, and was repaired to fight in the southwest Pacific
campaigns of 1942 by July of that year.

USS Raleigh CL 7.
Unlike the Helena, Raleigh was a much older vessel, built in
1924. Like the Helena, she was lightly damaged at Pearl Harbor,
receiving one torpedo hit and a near miss by a bomb. She was repaired and back
in the fight by summer of 1942.

USS Honolulu CL 48.
Another relatively new cruiser, the Honolulu received only moderate
damage to its hull and by mid January was repaired and escorting a convoy to
San Francisco.

USS Shaw DD 373.
The destroyer Shaw was in a floating drydock and received serious damage
from a bomb. Her bow section was completely blown off. Repaired and restored
for duty, Shaw went back in action in the summer of 1942.

USS Helm DD 388.
The Helm, a relatively new destroyer, was slightly damaged by two
near-miss bombs. She remained in service.

USS Curtiss AV 4.
The Curtiss was brand new seaplane tender. A bomb hit her and a Japanese
plane crashed into her upper works. She was repaired on the west coast of the
United States and back at Pearl Harbor by February, 1942.

USS Vestal AR 4.
The Vestal, a repair ship, was moored alongside the USS Arizona
on December 7th. Struck by two bombs and further damaged by the explosion in
the forward magazine of the Arizona, Vestal was moved to another
part of the harbor where she was grounded to avoid sinking. Vestal was
repaired and by August of 1942 she was busy repairing ships involved in the
Guadalcanal campaign.

USS Oglala CM 4. Oglala
was the fleet minelayer for the Pacific Fleet. An old ship, she was damaged
during the attack by nearby torpedo and bomb explosions. She rolled onto her side
and sank. Raised and repaired, she was returned to action as a repair ship for
internal combustion engines in 1944.

Amazingly, of the twenty ships mentioned above, which indeed are
the ones that received any damage of a nature greater than superficial, only Arizona,
Utah, and Oklahoma were not raised, repaired and returned to
wartime service. And Utah was little more than a hulk to begin with.
Ultimately, one of the real stories about Pearl Harbor is this superb salvage
effort to get the ships repaired well enough for a voyage to a West Coast
shipyard, where they were repaired and in many cases overhauled and modernized,
often returning to service in much finer condition than prior to the attack.
The men and women who performed these tasks at Pearl Harbor are as big a set of
heroes as any crew who sailed their ships against the Japanese in the Pacific.

All
the ships served with distinction later in the war, and it was fitting
that at the Battle of Surigao Strait when Admiral Jesse Oldendorf
led six U.S. Battleships, among them Pearl Harbor veterans California, WestVirginia, Maryland, Tennessee, and Pennsylvania in
column in a classic “Crossing the T” maneuver, just as Japanese Admiral Togo
had done to the Russian fleet at Tsushima Strait in 1905, and sank most of Vice
Admiral Nishimura’s striking force of battleships and cruisers.
Oldendorf’s victory at Surigao Strait is a testament to that magnificent
salvage effort.

The salvage work done at Pearl Harbor in the aftermath of the
December 7th attack was finely managed and heroically carried out. Icing to the
cake was added barely six months after the Japanese attack when the Naval
Shipyard located at Pearl completed the battle damage to the USS Yorktown from the Battle
of the Coral Sea, what would normally have taken several
months to repair: , in 48 hours, allowing her and her aircrews to participate in
the first major naval victory against the Japanese at the Battle of Midway.
Aircraft from the three US aircraft carriers, the Hornet, Enterprise,
and Yorktown, the ones that were missed at Pearl, sank four of the
Japanese aircraft carriers that participated in the December 7th attack on
Pearl Harbor, the Hiryu, Soryu, Kaga and Akagi.

A day later, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, in one of the most dramatic speeches in United States history, presented a request to the US Congress for a Declaration of War against the Japanese Empire:

"Yesterday, December 7,
1941 a date which will live in infamy the United States of America was suddenly
and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.

"The United States was
at peace with that nation and, at the solicitation of Japan, was still in
conversation with its Government and its Emperor looking toward the maintenance
of peace in the Pacific. Indeed, 1 hour after Japanese air squadrons had commenced
bombing in Oahu, the Japanese Ambassador to tie United States and his colleague
delivered to the Secretary of State a formal reply to a recent American
message. While this reply stated that it seemed useless to continue the
existing diplomatic negotiations, it contained no threat or hint of war or
armed attack.

"It will be recorded
that the distance of Hawaii from Japan makes it obvious that the attack was
deliberately planned many days or even weeks ago. During the intervening time
the Japanese Government has deliberately sought to deceive the United States by
false statements and expressions of hope for continued peace.

"The attack yesterday
on the Hawaiian Islands has caused severe damage to American naval and military
forces. I regret to inform you that very many American lives have been lost. In addition American ships
have been reported torpedoed on the high seas between San Francisco and
Honolulu.

"Yesterday the Japanese
Government also launched an attack against Malaya.

"Last night Japanese
forces attacked Hong Kong.

"Last night Japanese
forces attacked Guam.

"Last night Japanese
forces attacked the Philippine Islands.

"Last night the
Japanese attacked Wake Island.

"This morning the
Japanese attacked Midway Island.

"Japan has, therefore,
undertaken a surprise offensive extending throughout the Pacific area. The
facts of yesterday speak for themselves. The people of the United States have
already formed their opinions and well understand the implications to the very
life and safety of our Nation.

"As Commander in Chief
of the Army and Navy I have directed that all measures be taken for our
defense.

"Always will we
remember the character of the onslaught against us.

"No matter how long it
may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people, in
their righteous might, will win through to absolute victory.

"I believe I interpret
the will of the Congress and of the people when I assert that we will not only
defend ourselves to the uttermost but will make very certain that this form of
treachery shall never endanger us again.

"Hostilities exist.
There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory, and our
interests are in grave danger.

"With confidence in our
armed forces with the unbounded determination of our people we will gain the
inevitable triumph so help us God.

"I ask that the
Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on
Sunday, December 7, a state of war has existed between the United States and
the Japanese Empire."

Tuesday, November 24, 2015

In 1621 the settlers of the Plymouth Colony in what is now Massachusetts, gathered to celebrate a harvest of food they had no cause to even dream of when they landed. Thanks to the local Native Americans, the Wampanoag Tribe, who taught the colonists how to fish and gave them seeds to plant, the 102 colonists not only had sufficient food for the winter, they had enough to have a celebration of their bounty. [Claims for the first Thanksgiving rest in two other places, one a half-century earlier in 1565 at the Spanish Colony of St. Augustine, Florida, and the other in Virginia at the Jamestown Colony in 1607. The 1619 charter that founded the Charles City County village of Berkley Hundred included in its code an annual day of Thanksgiving.] Nevertheless, it remains Plymouth that we celebrate, in large part because of the symbolic rescue from death by starvation carried out by the generosity of the Wampanoag people. Sarah Josepha Buell Hale spent 91 years on this earth, from 1788 to 1879. And during those 91 years she produced an incredible record into the history of this nation. And she goes pretty much unrecognized today. Sarah Buell was born, raised and married in Newport, New Hampshire. She married David Hale, a local attorney in 1813 and bore him five children. Sarah became a widow in 1822 and remained in mourning the rest of her life. Nothing out of the ordinary at this point for those times. But Sarah was different. Very intelligent, much of her education was self attained, and she wrote poetry. She published a collection of her poetry in 1823, followed soon after by a novel, Northwood: Life North and South. Northwoodcarried a message that slavery was not only bad for the slave it was bad for the masters, too, dehumanizing both.

In 1828 Sarah accepted a position in Boston as ‘editress’ of Reverend John Blake’s Ladies’ Magazine. In 1830 she published her second collection of poetry, Poems for Children, which included the now famous Mary’s Lamb, which we know as ”Mary Had A Little Lamb”. In 1837 she began editing the widely popular Godey’s Ladies Book, after Philadelphian Louis Godey bought the Ladies Magazine. There Sarah remained working for the next forty years.

Sarah was a thinker, and a powerful one. She went beyond many of the social thinkers of the day and did so with a quiet logic. In her capacity as editress of Godey’s, she was a major influence on women authors of the nineteenth century and on some men as well: Hawthorne, Holmes, Irving to name a few.

The year she retired, Thomas Edison spoke the first words to be recorded, on a device he invented. Those words were the first lines of Mary’s Lamb.]

For a span of forty years during her life, she wrote to Congress asking for a national Thanksgiving Holiday. Her prayers were answered, but not by Congress.

Abraham Lincoln is well known for many of his speeches and historic documents: his two Inaugural Addresses, his Cooper Union Speech, his Gettysburg Address, the Emancipation Proclamation, among others. Here is one he seldom gets much credit for making.

By the President of the United States of America.A Proclamation.The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defense, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom. No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility and Union.In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the Unites States the Eighty-eighth.By the President: Abraham LincolnWilliam H. Seward, Secretary of State

And so, Sarah Hale’s forty year effort to have Thanksgiving made into a national Holiday came to an end in 1863 at the hands of President Abraham Lincoln.

Sarah and her daughter Sarah repose in a grove at Laurel Hill Cemetery in Philadelphia.

Times have been rough of late. The twenty-first century has offered little to further the cause of mankind. There is more conflict throughout the world than the world has seen for seventy years. Yet, every day, the sun rises and sets, crops grow and are harvested. We think too much and too often of what we do not have, and we forget what we do have. Thanksgiving is a reminder that we should do this, for “…They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People.

Wednesday, October 21, 2015

T. J. Stiles [author of Pulitzer Prize winning The
First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt, and Jesse
James, Last Rebel of the Civil War] gives us a deep understanding of
George Armstrong Custer in his new book Custer’s Trials [Alfred Knopf, in
stores October 27, advanced ordering at Amazon].

In “Rise”, the
first part of Custer’s Trials, Stiles takes us on a well-crafted journey
through Custer’s youth, and through the United States Military Academy at West
Point, where he excelled at few things military or academic, and including his
court-martial while a graduate awaiting orders.It then chronicles the career of the “boy-General” throughout hismeteoric rise in rank and legend during the
Civil War.At the same time Stiles, relates
aspects of Custer’s personal life and his romances, culminating in his marriage
to Elizabeth “Libbie” Bacon.

He persevered at West Point, and though he was last in his
class academically and first in demerits, he succeeded in passing his exams, thus
becoming eligible for graduation.In
spite of all of the negatives, Custer showed himself to possess many qualities
the military desired in its officers: poise, creative thought, conventional and
unconventional avenues to problem solving, the ability to get others motivated,
and stature, into which he grew through his activities, mostly in the course of
breaking rules…rules by which he abided just enough to get by.In short, Custer, with the assistance of West
Point, taught himself leadership.It was
not the leadership of someone who proclaims himself the leader, it is the one
who leads from the front and succeeds because others willingly follow.And
all the while building his repertoire of exploits, he began building
friendships with his classmates, and with politicians in hopes of receiving
assistance to further his career at his pace.

Stiles relates the details of his first trial: a
court-martial before he could leave West Point after graduation.The court found him guilty and ordered no
punishment except a reprimand in orders.And thus began the hard fighting and fast promotions of his successful
and charmed Civil War career.

Custer’s Civil War experiences were as charmed and full of
good fortune as were his West Point experiences.He grew to expect this of himself - indeed,
he was fearless in battle, leading from the front of his unit, sword in hand,
and not just as a symbol, but a weapon he used with devastating effect in every
engagement.

But there was another Custer – a self-serving Custer, who
cultivated friends, and curried favor with friendly higher-ups.This was the insecure Custer, as changeable
as the times, yet as constant as the sunrise with his contradictions.In this manner Stiles presents Custer as a man
who embraced the three main realms of his life – the private, public and
professional realms, sometimes mixing them but only to his advantage.In each he was comfortable and moved about in
them freely, enjoying the moments to their fullest, yet constantly laying and
cultivating the groundwork for advancement in all three realms.Sometimes conniving, and never missing an opportunity
to not only extol the virtues of his latest adventure, but enhance them as
well.

Custer’s rise through the ranks to generalship is well
known.But Stiles laces the telling with
personal details often missed in many works of history involving Custer, and
details the patronage afforded him by Generals McClellan, Pleasonton, and
Sheridan.

One measure of Custer’s leadership and how it affected his
men in the Michigan Brigade was when they began to copy his affectation of the
famous red necktie he wore with his gaudy uniform.But the men both loved and respected him for
his personal courage and his innate ability to know the lay of the land on
which they fought, and how he would invariably place them in the best position
to succeed to victory.Time after time Custer
won the hearts of the Union thanks to the newspaper coverage of the war [which
he curried], and was a favorite subject of sketch artist Alfred Waud.

Custer married Libbie on February 9th, 1864, and
when campaigning began again in the spring, Custer took the field under Phil
Sheridan, and Libbie moved back to a boarding house in Washington.There Libbie was able to have access to the
influential politicians, and even to the President himself.She
charmed them all and won favor for her Armstrong, as family called him.

His war culminated in the surrender at Appomattox.

No one amassed the legendary success amid the events of the
US Civil War like Custer did.

------------------------------------------------------->

In “Fall”, the
second half of Stiles' epic biography of Custer, Stiles chronicles the last
decade and a half of George Armstrong Custer’s life.What many biographers gloss over or omit
entirely is the path to Little Big Horn that Custer followedfrom the end of the war, but not Stiles.

First sent to Texas to restore law and order in a state
devastated by the war, he took Libbie along.Life was different in the post-war US Army. There was no more war, and he was still
commanding volunteers.Custer was forced
to use a hard hand even at controlling his own troops, including head-shaving,
whipping and executions.For a man who’s
leadership was repeatedly proven in combat, the lack of it was proven in
peace.It was a duty for which he was unsuited,
and unable to adapt.Nor would his
conservative Democrat views on race suffer the change that the war had
wrought.And Libbie shared those
feelings.

Yet Custer struggled to come to terms with the new reality
of the Freedmen.He began to think about
redefining himself.He did so in his
testimony before a subcommittee of the Committee on Reconstruction, advocating
black suffrage, and the continuation of the Freedmen’s Bureau.Custer’s testimony was in line with that of
other officers newly returned from the post war South.Collectively, they pointed to the regressive
results of President Johnson’s policies.The ensuing Civil Rights bill was vetoed by Johnson, and in effect, was
a declaration of war between the conservative President and the Radical
Republicans in Congress.But Custer’s
testimony belied his personal beliefs.Once again he was currying political favor from those who controlled
Congress.Then he went on a political
tour with President Johnson, evoking the wrath of Ulysses Grant.Grant ordered Custer to join the 7th
US Cavalry at Fort Riley without delay.Custer soon realized how badly he had erred in publicly supporting
Johnson.

A year later found Custer facing his second court-martial,
this time for absenting himself from his command without the proper
authority.He had left Fort Wallace,
Kansas apparently to get to Libbie, and traveled 275 miles to Fort Harker when
his command was about to launch a campaign against the Indians.Even worse, he had ordered a detachment of 75
men and three officers to escort the ambulance in which he rode.And it continued to get even worse.Custer ignored an attack on some of his men
by Indians, sent a detachment out after deserters with orders to bring none
back alive, and eventually had three deserters shot, but not killed, and did
not allow them to be treated for their wounds – all without a trial.In a rather long proceeding, Custer was found
guilty across the board and sentenced to one year’s suspension and forfeiture
of his pay.Ultimately the Indians
intervened and Sherman and Sheridan petitioned Grant to restore Custer to the 7th
US Cavalry.Grant complied, if only to
keep Custer in the field and out of politics and out of trouble.

Thus Custer began the phase of his career that would mark
him as “Indian Killer.”He operated in
Kansas and Oklahoma, destroying Indian villages, and chasing after famous
Indian leaders such as Black Kettle.

Unable to rise in rank, Custer attempted to end his Army
career and support himself and Libbie in a style more grand than Army pay could
provide.Custer took an extended leave, and made a disastrous
foray into the world of Wall Street.He
sought funds to support a silver mine in Colorado.It failed when the mine failed.

In 1871, Custer returned to the Army, stationed in Kentucky
to suppress the Ku Klux Klan and the illegal manufacture of moonshine
alcohol.It was boring duty.Custer yearned for the openness of the Great
Plains.He turned to writing there, and
while he had a market for his work, it was too small to allow him to leave the
Army.

In the Spring of 1873, Custer received word that the 7th
Cavalry was being reassigned north to the Dakota Territory.He and Libby began packing.Over the next three years, he mounted three
great expeditions: along the Yellowstone River in 1873 - fighting battles on
August 4th and August 11th; the Black Hills Expedition in
1874; and finally, the Little Big Horn Expedition in 1876.

The noted historian Frederick Jackson Turner who wrote at
the end of the 19th century and for 3 decades into the 20th,
formulated the Frontier Thesis, which
was presented as a paper to the American Historical Association in Chicago, July 12, 1893,
titled “The Significance of the Frontier
in American History.” It first appeared in the Proceedings of the State
Historical Society of Wisconsin, December 14, 1893.He cites the 1890 census report’s
proclamation that, “…‘Up to and including 1880 the country had a frontier of
settlement, but at present the unsettled area has been so broken into by
isolated bodies of settlement that there can hardly be said to be a frontier
line. In the discussion of its extent, its westward movement, etc., it can not,
therefore, any longer have a place in the census reports.’ This brief official
statement marks the closing of a great historic movement. Up to our own day
American history has been in a large degree the history of the colonization of
the Great West. The existence of an area of free land, its continuous
recession, and the advance of American settlement westward, explain American
development.”

In his paper, Turner presents the role of the frontier as
the developer of Americanism, that the farther from the Atlantic Coast one got
on the way west, the farther they got from the influence of their European
roots.The Frontier was the blacksmith’s
hammer, forge and tempering bucket that produced American Exceptionalism and
American Identity.

In the fifteen years from the end of the Civil War to the
end of the Frontier, as the Census report put it, there was perhaps no other
person whose day-to-day life on that Frontier had more influence in the final
forging of the American Identity and Exceptionalism than George Armstrong
Custer.

Stiles' book, 472 pages not including acknowledgements, is a
most thorough, detailed, and well-supported biography.The cast of characters is rich, and most are
well known, but even the lesser known help to paint the portrait, often filling
in gaps.The principals are fascinating,
and brought down from their legendary status by relating their intimate
interactions and thoughts.George
Armstrong Custer was a truly great soldier during the Civil War.The absence of war was a large part of his
undoing, for it forced him into realms he had not entered before, that he was
unable to manipulate to his advantage, and for which he was wholly unprepared.

Custer’s Trials is the consummate biography of George Armstrong
Custer.

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"History teaches us that men and nations behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives."--Abba Eban

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"There is no witness so dreadful, no accuser so terrible as the conscience that dwells in the heart of every man."--Polybius

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"History is philosophy teaching by example, and also warning; its two eyes are geography and chronology."--James A. Garfield

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